The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

As Kobe Bryant once said, “There is power in understanding the journey of others to help create your own.”
That’s why the Learning Leader Show exists—to get together and understand the journeys of successful leaders, so that we can better understand our own.
This show is full of stories told by world-class leaders. Personal stories of successes, failures, and lessons learned along the way. Our guests come from diverse backgrounds—some are best-selling authors, others are genius entrepreneurs, and one even made a million dollars wearing t-shirts for a year. My role in this endeavor is to talk to the smartest, most creative, always-learning leaders in the world so that we can learn from them as we each create our own journeys.

The Learning Leader Show is supported by Rhone. Use the code "Hawk" for 15% off. Rhone... premium activewear engineered with principle, performance and progress for the modern man. Rhone builds clothing around 3 main tenants: Cutting-edge Performance, Premium Comfort, and Simplistic Style.

Noah Kagan was the #30 employee at Facebook (started there in 2005), and the #4 employee at Mint.com. He came up with the idea of real-time updates and executed with one engineer (Mark Slee) at Facebook. He is now the Chief Sumo at Sumo.com (A domain in which he paid $1.5m to own. We discussed why on this episode).

This episode is different than most in that it was more conversational, and less interview. There was real-time coaching, and off the cuff conversation about how I should progress The Learning Leader. If you are uncomfortable with creative use of the English Language (re: use of curse words), then skip this episode. If not, I think you'll really like it.

"You shouldn't get a job... You should get a career."

Show Notes:

Sustained Excellence = Getting feedback from professionals

Noah hired pros from NPR to review his interview transcripts.

"Most of the time we have too much. Need to edit it down."

How to create a narrative -- The NPA producer changed his life

Employees -- "They are not my people. They are people I work with. I don't like the word employee."

How do you hold others accountable? -- Autonomy, coaching, help when needed. Hire correctly.

"What I'm great at is starting..."

How the quest to India changed Noah's life

"You'll almost always push hard on the last lap."

The impact Mark Zuckerberg had on him when he worked for him at Facebook

"When I was at Facebook, there was a singular focus: Growth."

"You shouldn't get a job, get a career." -- "I was a cubicle monkey at Intel"

Using a journal to plan your day/week/month

"Here is a story I've never shared before..."

Why you should always ask yourself..."What's exciting for me?"

Why you should go on walks with your spouse/significant other

Instead of building something in a month, why not build it by Monday? -- Do it quicker than you think possible

You need to constantly try and test it out... Don't overthink it. Will people pay me for this? Keep evolving

Keys to building your audience

"Art of The Deal" is a helpful book

Noah's salary? Low 6 figures

"Good people don't work for cheap rates"

The two ways to scale a business

Technology

People

What Noah learned about vision --

Initially didn't believe in it... But he has matured and fully believes in it. "As I've gotten older..."

The Learning Leader Show is supported by Rhone. Use the code "Hawk" for 15% off. Rhone... premium activewear engineered with principle, performance and progress for the modern man. Rhone builds clothing around 3 main tenants: Cutting-edge Performance, Premium Comfort, and Simplistic Style.

David Novak is Co-Founder, Retired Chairman and CEO of Yum! Brands, Inc. (Pizza Hut, KFC, and Taco Bell), one of the world’s largest restaurant companies with nearly 43,000 restaurants in more than 130 countries and territories. He stepped down as CEO on January 1, 2015 and retired from Yum! and Yum!’s Board in May 2016. During his time as CEO, Yum! doubled in size and became a global powerhouse going from approximately 20% of its profits coming from outside the U.S. in 1997 to nearly 70% in 2014.

David is also the best-selling author of multiple books including Taking People With You: The Only Way To Make Big Things Happen. In May 2016, he founded OGO (O Great One!) a consumer lifestyle brand on a mission to turn the world on to the awesome power of recognition and remedy what he calls the “global recognition deficit.”

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

Sustained Excellence = "You must be passionate about what you do." Warren Buffet said he "tap dances to work everyday." You should strive to do that.

Must also be a constant learner/grower.

Have a healthy dissatisfaction for the status quo

When people struggle at work, it's typically because they don't like the job

What do you say to skeptics about the "do what you love" advice: "Colonel Sanders started KFC late in life with his social security check. It's never too late."

Must be self reflective. Develop a strategy for yourself. Do a needs assessment. Dig hard at understanding yourself.

The impact of moving his entire childhood. Living in 23 states by the 7th grade. Moved 3 times per year. Lived in trailer parks most of his childhood.

Advice to people early in their career: "Don't wait until you have a management job to lead. Start doing it immediately."

"I tried to learn everything I could from the people above me."

"The minute I stopped learning, I asked for another job."

"I looked at my boss as my coach. A good boss should be a coach."

The manage 2 up plus 2 down strategy:

Make your boss very successful and make his/her boss very successful

Help the people directly working for you successful and directly help the people that work for them to be great

"Every time I met with the CEO, I always brought 3-5 ideas every time we met. I always brought value to those meetings."

"When a good opportunity came up, he thought of me"

Coaching is an "AND" job -- Tell them what you like AND how they can improve. Must do both.

The 3X5 note card exercise: Write a strength and a developmental area for yourself and share it with others so they know what you're working on.

How can CEOs get people to trust them and tell the truth? -- Ask people what they would do if they had your role. LISTEN.

"You have to be vulnerable enough to want to know the truth"

The power of recognition -- "The secret weapon I had as a leader was to recognize great performance to drive the behaviors we valued"